The Seven Ravens

In a small house at the edge of the forest there lived a girl named Liv. She was the youngest in the family, and she had never met her seven big brothers. Mother always said they had vanished long ago, before Liv was even born. 'It was an old magic,' Mother whispered, 'from a time when the forest was still wild and the stars walked closer to the earth.' Liv loved to hear Mother sing about the brothers when twilight fell. It was a soft lullaby about seven birds who flew around the top of a glass mountain, waiting for someone to come and bring them home. Liv knew the song by heart, word for word, note for note.

One evening, when Liv was seven years old, she was sitting on her little stool by the window and looking out towards the forest. That was when she saw them for the first time. Seven ravens, black as night, came flying over the fir trees. They circled three times above the roof and then vanished towards the mountains in the north. Liv held her breath. She turned to Mother and Father and asked softly: 'Was that them? Were those my brothers?' Mother and Father looked at each other for a long time. Then Mother nodded. 'Yes, little Liv. And they are waiting. They have been waiting for a long time now.' That was when Liv made up her mind. Not with grand words, but in quiet, the way brave decisions are usually made. She would go and bring them home.

The next morning Liv packed a small backpack. She put in a little bundle of bread, a bottle of spring water, a warm woollen shawl, and Grandfather's old brass compass. Last of all she took the small smooth stone that Mother had given her when she was born. The stone was round as the face of a die and warm against her palm, as though it remembered the sunshine of a summer long ago. 'Carry it with you,' Mother had always said, 'when you need to remember who you are.' Liv kissed Mother and Father on the cheek, promised to come back, and stepped out into the dewy morning. The forest whispered her northward.